Posted
by
Soulskillon Friday May 31, 2013 @02:26PM
from the novel-use-of-resources dept.

phantomfive writes "Some countries are worried about the privacy implications of Google Maps, but Lithuania is using them to find tax cheats. 'After Google's car-borne cameras were driven through the Vilnius area last year, the tax men in this small Baltic nation got busy. They have spent months combing through footage looking for unreported taxable wealth. ... Two recent cases netted $130,000 in taxes and penalties after investigators found houses photographed by Google that weren't on official maps. ... "We were very impressed," said Modestas Kaseliauskas, head of the State Tax Authority. "We realized that we could do more with less and in shorter time."' The people of Lithuania don't seem to mind. 'Authorities have been aided by the local populace. "We received even more support than we expected," said Mr. Kaseliauskas.'"

The people of Lithuania don't seem to mind. 'Authorities have been aided by the local populace. "We received even more support than we expected," said Mr. Kaseliauskas.'

It's only normal and expected. I would help authorities catch the assholes who don't pay their taxes. Unfortunately, where I live authorities don't even try catching them, mainly because they're all the same.

Aside from 'fairness' in itself(which probably is a motivator, you can even piss off some of the smarter flavors of monkeys by presenting them with 'unfair' situations), I suspect that perfectly sensible self-interest is at work:

When the tax man comes, the poor are least able to hide(they have no lawyers, no accountants, and they tend to spend close to what they earn, so even if they are being paid in cash under the table, they still show up in sales taxes); but they also have fuck all money to collect.

The wealthy(especially so in countries with high levels of economic inequality) are where the assets are, often a commanding percentage of them; but they also have by far the most sophisticated measures for avoiding taxation.

It's the intermediate cases, who might actually have enough money to even be worth the trouble of collecting; but have neither the money nor the influence to engage in effective tax evasion, who end up footing the bill(since going after people poorer than them is nearly pointless, there just isn't any wealth there, and going after people richer than them has traditionally been difficult). Why wouldn't they resent tax evasion?

The wealthy(especially so in countries with high levels of economic inequality) are where the assets are, often a commanding percentage of them; but they also have by far the most sophisticated measures for avoiding taxation.

Like the USA? We have greater economic inequality since the robber baron era. And we seem hell bent on becoming the newest third world country.

The problem is, and the GP hinted at it, taxes are regressive.The rich can simply move to avoid taxes, while the poor are left holding the bag. Rich can avoid taxes, the poor cannot. Additionally, when the wealthy move or move their assets to avoid taxes (confiscatory) it hurts the poor more than it does the wealthy, taking jobs with them, but leaving those that fill the jobs behind.

They once tried a tax on "Luxury" items, like boats (yachts) and other things, the rich simply stopped buying them. It didn't hurt them, it hurt those that built, sold, maintained and staffed them. It was repealed fairly quickly. Problem is, this admittedly anecdotal evidence, is never remembered by those who keep trying to soak the rich.

Really, taxing the RICH doesn't help anyone. It just makes you feel better.

That proves nothing other than that the top 10% make most of the money, substantially more than 90% of it in fact. Why the fuck SHOULDN'T they have to pay more?

The top 15% in this country make $100,000 or more a year, that is a long way from "wealthy" in most people's books and it makes perfect sense that all the people who make greater than $100,000 a year should pay more than all the people below poverty level even if there are MORE people below poverty level.

If it makes you feel better, look up what percentage of their income the top 10% pay in sales taxes versus the bottom 50%.

I actually did look up a little bit on it. Warren Buffet was the first name that came to mind. He paid over 7 million dollars in taxes, and if you include his 23% share in Berkshire Hathaway he paid over $1billion in taxes.

I know $7 mil is a lot more than I paid in last year, and he paid in an effect rate of 17%, which is again higher than my rate, and my wife and I are of those top 15%.

You really need to fact check yourself, and maybe cite a source for why you'd ever factor in the taxes owed by his C-corporation into his personal tax obligation. If Berkshire were an LLC maybe, but it's not and you're dead wrong.

It is real fucking unfair, especially when you consider the reason why those ~50% of the people "not paying income tax" don't pay income tax because they don't make ANY FUCKING MONEY to fucking tax because those 10% have fucking siphoned all the FUCKING MONEY that would have gone to wages for people to FUCKING PAY TAXES ON into their own pockets. You stupid FUCKING moron.

So, why would the rich do anything other than protect their wealth against people who are trying to confiscate it? You act surprise that when people go after wealth the wealth hides. I know it makes you feel good to say "fucking unfair", but what you don't realize is that "fair" is subjective term, and has nothing to do with reality or rose tinted viewpoints. What matters is what actually happens, not what you "intended" the result to be.

According to my quick research, yes the top 7% own about 63% of the wealth, but that also means that 93% own 37% of the wealth. These numbers are discouraging, but it dosn't mean that 63% of the wealth should pay almost 90% of the taxes.

According to my quick research, yes the top 7% own about 63% of the wealth, but that also means that 93% own 37% of the wealth. These numbers are discouraging, but it dosn't mean that 63% of the wealth should pay almost 90% of the taxes.

It also doe not mean that 63% of the wealth should pay just 63% of the taxes either.

If "Chris" does not earn enough to feed the family, should we be taxing Chris at all? Most would set the tax rate for Chris' family pretty low if not zero. If there are enough families in this situation, even though collectively they might own a significant fraction of the wealth of the nation, on a per-family basis they are barely making by, and while we might be able to squeeze out a few shekels from each of them, it prob

Which is why I would actually argue with doing away with income taxes all together and implement a national sales tax. But we shouldn't let Congress decide on this, we need a Constitutional Amendment that would cap the amount the sales tax could be based GDP. Certain items would always be tax exempt. Food, Gas, Utilities. Add in the fact that Congress has to pass a budget that can be no greater than the percentage of GDP that the sales tax is. I'm sure the proposal is missing a few items, but in theory

When the tax man comes, the poor are least able to hide(they have no lawyers, no accountants, and they tend to spend close to what they earn, so even if they are being paid in cash under the table, they still show up in sales taxes); but they also have fuck all money to collect

At least in the US, "the poor" are generally getting far more out of the system, tax wise, than they are putting in.

Are they ?Two cases spring to mind housing and wagesfirst housing a tenant gets government money to pay a proportion up to 100% in some cases to pay their landlord. The landlord has a buy to let mortgage which is paid for by the rent received and gives him a comfortable profit. Seems to me the government is subsidizing the landlord clearly the cost of providing that housing is more than if the council was to buy the house pay the mortgage and rent it to the tenant. if the tenant in that house continues t

(I'm in Canada which shouldn't be much different) That's true for the bottom 10% or so, it's the next 40 or 50% that really suffer. There was a recent study, no link sorry, that the bottom 50% of Canadians actually pay a larger percent of their income in taxes and government fees then the top 50%. It's the fees that are the real killer. Need tires? Well there's a $20 environment fee so if all you can afford is the $60 cheap Chinese tire that you'd be nuts to take on the freeway, well there's a 33% tax, I mean fee, plus the sales tax and GST on the fee bringing the price up to close to $100 per tire plus mounting and balancing. Buy a top of the line S rated tire for $300 a piece, well the fee is still $20 so you're paying $320 plus taxes. Either way disposal consists of throwing the worn tires into a container and shipping to Africa for a small profit so the environment fee is just a tax that hits the poorThere are a million example of similar fees and taxes that actually hit the poor harder so even though they pay little income tax they don't have any near the money left over from taxes etc compared to the rich who also get low income tax and pay a much smaller percent in fees. Oh, GST is reimbursed if you're a business as well here and if you're rich, you have a business and tax number.

Both:)Authorities cheat, wealthy people who are not authorities cheat as well and there's some sort of mutually-advantageous non-involvement agreement going on between the two.

About 8 years back there was a country-wide police audit which intended to find those members of the police force owning unjustified assets. They found... 2 (two) guys and sentenced them to... disciplinary move to the countryside for three years.No further comment.

Personally, I would think that people would be happy to help the tax cops find the tax cheats. When rich people and corporations cheat on their taxes I have to pay more.

And yet I understand his surprise. For some reason, ordinary joes & janes (who get a salary and have little opportunity to cheat on their taxes) often seem to be against the idea of clamping down on high-end tax cheats. For some reason, their feeling that taxes are unpleasant (to put it mildly) translates into an aversion to the idea of them being properly enforced.

Yeah, it seems nearly all Americans think of themselves merely as temporarily embarrassed millionaires. Which leads to stupidity like people voting for politicians that promise to cut the taxes of the rich and end the programs that the voter needs to eat.

It's certainly not the case that wages are incredibly depressed compared to productivity, and the average private employer wages in this country force people to live paycheck to paycheck. Oh man, if you could only imagine a country if people might unexpectedly lose their job, face high unemployment and need weeks they don't have to find new work. It would be so horrible, thank god we don't live in a country like that, and we can afford to be crass and ignore the possibility of anyone starving.

The city on a hill is a myth. Manifest Destiny is a myth. 'Murrikan exceptionalism is a crock of shit. Any sort of decency or aspiration is a universal human trait. And unless you graduate from college/vo-tech, work damn hard, and/or get lucky, you're not going to do better than the clowns that appear on the Jerry Springer show.

PS - see if you can find Benghazi on a map. Hell, see if you can find the US on a map.

Yeah, it seems nearly all Americans think of themselves merely as temporarily embarrassed millionaires. Which leads to stupidity like people voting for politicians that promise to cut the taxes of the rich and end the programs that the voter needs to eat.

The problem is I get the choice between Candidate A, who says he's going to raise the taxes for the rich (greater than half what I make) to fund programs for the poor (less than one tenth of what I make), and Candidate B, who says he's going to lower the ta

In an environment of sufficient economic inequity. The ability to effectively express ones rights and achieve liberty is reserved almost exclusively for those with the means to control the system to their advantage.

To create a greater liberty for the larger population, by necessity the license of the plutocrats to corrupt and distort the system to their own advantage must be limited.

My ideas are not at all contradictory. Your understanding of socialism and libertarianism is merely limited.

Your practical expression of liberty can be limited by your means, or by the infringement of a non-government entity, just as much as it can be limited by rule of law. Libertarian socialism seeks to enhance your practical liberty, not just your theoretical liberty, by using good laws to protect the people and their means of expressing liberty from exploitation and by removing the bad laws that can be

I commend your efforts to educate, but I must warn you that you will not have much success. Many of these folks simply lack the education to understand what you are saying. I think this is not an accident either, American education and media seems to be designed to generate this outcome.

I did not say all laws are required to preserve your liberty. DMCA does not help on that front, for instance. But without any laws, your liberty would only be what you could afford with your own power. Without laws, your private properties are only yours because you are able to physically defend them against anyone that want to take it from you.

I can't speak for him, but I want my fellow countrymen to feel good about themselves, have opportunities, make opportunities, and not be beholden to the people they vote into office for their livelihood. I want them to earn their housing, food, and medical care, because not only do we all get the benefit of their labor, but we also get less crime, better cared-for children, and other benefits. They too will get benefits that can't be had any other way: self-respect and personal growth for instance.

It wasn't a strawman anymore than the GP poster "You want your fellow countrymen to vote for the liberty to starve?" comment was.

The clear implication is that without Government people would starve, and with government nobody starves. Neither of which is entirely accurate. It is this fear tactic that doesn't deal in facts which is designed to illicit emotional responses to get people to vote a certain way. It is Liberalism 101.

You can go on a hunger strike anytime you want, that is really what "liberty to s

That's because the nomad nations get slaughtered to insignificance by organized governments every once in a while. Watch the Simpsons episode about the board with a nail in it, and you'll get what I mean.

Seriously. I should just keep my yap shut and just mod you flamebait, but I'll bite.

I am sick of dipshits like you asking me to constantly choose between voting for smaller government and the political values I believe in and being a second-class person or else voting for big nanny state government but at least knowing that if my significant other is in the hospital, I'll be able to see him.

I mean, seriously, what the hell is wrong with you dipshits? You're telling me that I can either have small government, which I assume means ending the meaningless war on drugs and terror that are turning us into a police state, or I can get married to the person I love?

No, I'll tell you what the hell you mean by small government. You want a government that tells me what I can and cannot put in my body, from substances that have been used throughout human history safely and are beginning to be recognized as legitimately medically useful to my boyfriend's body parts. You want a government with TSA checkpoints at every airport, railroad station, and probably at every freeway interchange if you had your way. You want "small government" that will dump billions upon billions of dollars into bombing the shit out of third world countries and propping up dictators. You want a border patrol with the right to stop and search anyone, anywhere, anytime solely based on the color of their skin.

Hell, what the hell do I care?

I used to be a Libertarian. I still have a Libertarian keychain I bought four years ago. Let's face it. The Libertarian party isn't going to get into power or be in a position to do jack shit until hell freezes over.

I guess you've convinced me. If voting Democrat will continue legitimizing homosexuality and transgender identities and if voting Democrat might get the gears rolling to respect the people of states who have voted to end marijuana prohibition, I guess I'll vote Democrat.

Because there's sure as hell no way that the Republicans represent anything I even remotely care about. Either way, social security will remain a joke. "Obamacare" (federalized Romneycare) will continue to be a handout to medical "insurance" companies with little hope of real reform. We're going to continue being Team America World Police. The imaginary property crowd will continue gaining clout in Washington, in Redmond, and in Silicon Valley until I'll probably need to register my general-purpose computer without a DRM locked bootloader just the same as a firearm. We're going to continue throwing orders of magnitude more money at pointless wars and "cyber" warfare and "omg the terrirists" than we do at exploring our own solar system and basic scientific research.

But hell. Why the hell not. At least with the Democrats, I might be able to get married, maybe adopt some day, and buy the only substance I've ever used that seems to do jack shit for my anxiety attacks over the counter at any corner Walgreens. (Sorry, I need something more effective than a placebo, so anti-depressants, 5-HTP, St. John's wort, you name it, they're all out. If anything, everything I just listed makes it worse.)

Having Libertarians in power would be great. No more gay marriage and no more straight marriage either! Get the government out of the damned marriage business and separate the legal implications from the religious issues. It's not going to happen, though. The more shit I hear out of Republicans and right-wing nuts like you just makes me wonder whether or not I should vote Democrat for the first time in my life in 2014 and again in '16. (Might be amusing to have another Clinton in the white house, and Billy might just be able to pull off being the first first husband evar.)

If you are a homosexual and voting for republicans I can only say "I am Disappoint". Many of them believe you are sort of evil creature and would have you put to death if they could. The rest will claim they love you but hate what you do, which really means what you are.

While I am no fan of the democrats at least they don't have it as a party plank to deny you your civil rights.

An LGBTQ person voting for Republicans in 2013 would be like an African American voting for George Wallace in 1962.

Blacks voting for the DNC en masse has really helped them so much. Care to explain how keeping black people poor (welfare) and dependent has helped them? Heaven forbid one makes it successful and conservative, only to be called Uncle Tom to shame them back onto the DNC reservation.

I normally would agree with you on "typical idiot" grounds, but in this case, I think you've sold a lot of people short.

I, along with plenty of others, object to taxes - Mine, Bill Gates', yours - Because we have a government that doesn't even pretend to represent our interests anymore. we therefore view starving it out of existence the most rational course of action (and don't give me that crap about getting to choose between Tweedledee and Tweedledum every few years).

Yes, we have a country that really should just get it over with and split in half along red/blue boundaries. But deeper than that, we could find far more common ground than disagreement, on which the government consistently goes against the will of us all, in favor of either itself or its non-compulsory financial supporters (ie, Fritz Hollings, D-Disney). We have wars no one supports, prohibitions no one supports, social controls no one supports, entitlements only those receiving them support, a justice system that protects serial rapists and murderers from real justice while putting good people away for technicalities. Even down to the petty BS, we have red light cameras proven to cause more accidents, speed limits everyone goes at least 10mph over, a drinking age that practically no one reaches before getting drunk... For each of the "big" laws we can agree we need to keep us from each other's throats, we have a thousand papercuts to which we add the insult that we have to pay to inflict them on ourselves.

So I don't want the rich to cheat. I don't want to get rich out of a delusion that someday I'll get to cheat. I don't want to not pay my "fair share" - More like I don't want a share at all of what they offer.

I don't know how a person could come to believe this without becoming a violent revolutionary soon afterwards. If you honestly want to starve your government to death and go through the bloody transition to a new one, why not take a shot at seeing it happen within your lifetime rather than "suffering" your whole life for the supposed good of future generations?

You are delusional. Government is not the major threat to your liberty now. It is the corporations and rich guys who threaten your liberty. The rich will use any means to threaten your liberty. Right now they buy politicians, corrupt the government, run astro turf organizations, hire shills and liars to get you. Among all these instruments they use, democratic government is the only thing that you can use at some point to get the control back, get the country back. At some point enough people will pay enough attention to clean up the mess.

And the rich know it too. So they use all the resources they have to create a pathological irrational antipathy to all government and persuade you to reduce taxes and reduce it ability to enforce laws. Just remember this, if you actually manage to starve the government out of existence, there is nothing to stop you from being enslaved by the rich once again.

If you are not rich, the democracy is the only weapon you have, the only way to achieve liberty. Starving the beast is a snake oil sold by self serving rich people and the shills bought by them.

As far as I can see both you and he have valid points. The government does serve in a protective capacity for the poor, and the government does abuse its powers, sometimes leading to wars in the case of the US. The correct answer of course is a middle ground, controlling the government and restraining the abuses while encouraging the equalising and protective ability for the poor. Note that means the poor, not the unionised public sector, which has proven itself very capable of holding entire countries to r

The day you shrink the government small enough to be drowned in a bathtub, some rich guy will drown it. Then you will be subjugated by some private guy and you have no chance of ever getting back. It would take centuries to overthrow them and bring back democracy.

Yes, the rich people are using the power of the government and threaten you. What good is liberty if you have been looted completely and left without any means of using the liberty for in any meaningful way? The solution is not to weaken the government, but to reduce the influence of money on government. That is why the ruling "money is speech" should send chills down your spine. The top one percent have not more "speech" than the bottom 90%. It is our government, we need to take control of it, make it powerful, powerful enough to give the man on the street a fighting chance.

The day you get rid of the government's police protection of the rich, the "rich guy" becomes a body in the gutter.

You will be the body in the gutter. Rich will always buy the thugs they need to protect themselves. There is some chance you could get police on your side, someday with enough political action. There is no chance in hell you will outgun the henchmen of the rich.

I'm not sure that that accurately describes the situation in Lithuania.

Many of the people who are rich there are perceived, rightly or wrongly, of having made their money, not by working hard, but by having influence. When Lithuania privatized large sections of the economy, state assets were often bought at a bargain price by those who were friends of the officials handling the privatization. These may have been former communist officials, kingpins of organized crime, or both (assuming that there's a diff

1. I want to be rich.2. If I was rich, I wouldn't want to pay a lot of taxes.3. Therefore, I don't want rich people to pay a lot of taxes.

4. Make sure the government taxes income instead of wealth.5. Profit!

#4 is nice because if you're rich, you can look like a saint by calling for higher taxes on the wealthy knowing that most people are ignorant of the difference between wealth and income. You can smile knowing hard working highly paid (but not necessarily rich) professionals,

The point remains in that case: an illogical/capricious law enforced inconsistently or selectively is going to be even more illogical and capricious than such a law upheld uniformly. Doesn't mean that you don't want to get it off the books as soon as possible; but selective enforcement is a beautiful tool for keeping shit on the books: if you don't enforce it in situations were somebody might fight back, it could remain for decades without trouble, ready to be thrown at anybody unsympathetic enough to be a

If this necessary evil were fairly and evenly enforced, everyone making over $x would pay the same percentage of tax on income, with no loopholes. That way Joe Ghetto pays nothing on his meager poverty-line income, Joe Sixpack eats a 25%** cut of his middle-class income (no mortgage/child-care credits, etc), and Joe Caviar would dole out 25%** of his massive income (no trusts, shell companies, overseas banks accounts, etc.)

This would damned sure get folks to pay attention, and maybe they'd start screaming a

If this necessary evil were fairly and evenly enforced, everyone making over $x would pay the same percentage of tax on income, with no loopholes.

Close, but in your scenario it's possible to end up with less in hand as your income increases. How the real system works is that you only pay taxes on the portion of your income that exceeds $x (and higher percentages on portions exceeding other tresholds), solving this problem.

Slavery is the obvious point. Even if you ignore slavery, the minorities were exploited ruthlessly.
Would you care to look at how people other than Whites fared at that time? Chinese gold prospectors were systematically discriminated and driven out. Indian (from the Indian subcontinent) were denied property rights and the farms they owned were confiscated. US Supreme Court (Justice Sutherland) ruled that "yes, yes, Indians are caucasians, but t

After 100 years of hard fought victories of progressives and liberals, you are able to blow smoke imagining "collusion" can't be all that bad. But when collusion, cartel forming, monopolies were are legal, ordinary Americans eked out subsistence living, working in dangerous factories, living in shacks, breathing polluted air, drinking dirty water. That is the lot of White Americans who fared much much better tha

When rich people and corporations cheat on their taxes I have to pay more.

Agreed on the rich people part. Disagree on the corporation part. Corporations don't pay taxes. They just pass them through to their customers and employees.

Money is just a representation of productivity. People are the only source of productivity, whether they're acting individually or organized together into a company. Taxes are a diversion of part of that productivity into the government's coffers (not a big deal because t

That's stupid for 2 reasons:1. I'll bet you good money you believe in more than 1% of what the government is doing: 1% of the US federal budget is $38 billion, which just about covers either federal law enforcement (including prosecutions) or transportation infrastructure (including air travel, highways, rail, and cargo shipping), but not both. Cut out law enforcement and you might as well not have a legal system. Cut out transportation and all that stuff you currently see showing up in your local Walmart won't get there. I highly doubt you want to live in that kind of country.

2. If Paul evades taxes successfully, the government will simply try to collect revenue from someone else. If they can't, they will borrow the money to function. If they can't borrow the money, they will inflate the currency.

Basically, your argument, which I'm guessing you think is libertarian, is actually anarchist - a coercive authority with no money can't do anything at all. So on that basis, I'd recommend that you move to Somalia, Afghanistan, or one of the other areas of the world that has no functioning government whatsoever, and thus no taxes.

1. I'll bet you good money you believe in more than 1% of what the government is doing: 1% of the US federal budget is $38 billion, which just about covers either federal law enforcement (including prosecutions) or transportation infrastructure (including air travel, highways, rail, and cargo shipping), but not both. Cut out law enforcement and you might as well not have a legal system.

Note that there is a difference between Federal Law Enforcement and State Law Enforcement in the USA. The overwhelming m

Some other things federal law enforcement regularly gets involved in dealing with:- Kidnappings- Gun trafficking- Human trafficking- Drug smuggling- Gang violence- Organized crime- Bank heists- Counterfeiting- Securities fraud- Hate crimes committed by groups like the KKK or Aryan Nation- And, oh yeah, terrorists (I'm not saying we should be running around afraid of terrorists, but there are some, and the FBI is the leading organization to deal with them in the US)

It should be noted that most of those things became issues for the Feds when the FBI was looking for reasons to continue their funding levels. Kidnapping used to be handled just fine by the locals. Ditto Bank robberies. Ditto gang violence. Ditto Organized crime.

And "gun trafficking" wasn't even a crime till the Feds made it one. Ditto "drug smuggling". And "hate crimes".

Counterfeiting I'll give you. Not an FBI job, but the T-men like to keep busy with it.

You may be unaware of this but libertarians have solutions for all of this - 4x4s and mud trails instead of roads, dudes with guns instead of defense, open pits of burning garbage, DIY sewage systems and surgical masks instead of sanitation.

We tried that. People were dieing from unsafe food products- meat that was slaughtered in unsanitary conditions, alcohol that has gasoline and other non-edible fillers added in, and crooks who just plain lied about what was in their product. Read Upton Sinclair's The Jungle sometime.

Foo and shelter for the poor? Non-government efforts have been attempted since pre-Roman times. They all failed miserably- people would literally die of starvation in major cities. Now we have government efforts. They're not perfect, but they work- the starvation in western civilizations is damn near zero, the remainder being child abuse cases.

Defense- please tell me how you're going to self organize for defense against an opponent that can kill you by tens of thousands from a continent away, and pay for this effort? Oh, and please tell me how you'll do this without creating an organization that will just take power.

Roads? Well since we never prevented anyone from building them, the US must have a had a sweet set of private roads for cross country travel before the government stepped in and fucked them up. Oh wait, it was the exact opposite- the government was needed to build and finance the interstate system. In fact, there's been no time in the history of the world where an extensive network of private roads was made adequate to the nation's transportation needs.

The turnpike system of private roads in England worked well enough.
The option of building the interstates as private roads was never attempted; instead the government just went ahead and did it. Same in Europe, except in France you do pay a toll to use their Freeways, though they are operated by the government. But from first principles there's no reason why a private firm shouldn't build, operate and charge for the use of a road.
You're probably right about the rest of the stuff - but it's as well to be b

>> Their are free market options like private arbitration firms, private security firms, bounty hunters, selling claims to those are willing to prosecute (champerty), and other solutions that haven't been allowed to be discovered yet.

Are you saying that the guy with the bigger gun should always win the contract dispute?

The main problem that makes anarchy untenable is that, if you can succeed in throwing off the proverbial "yoke of government taxation", there will be a power vacuum, which will soon be filled by power seekers of various types.

If you would rather fight your whole life to prevent being killed by the inevitable warlords and their "private security", as opposed to living in our current system, then our minds cannot meet.

Yes, torts like fraud occur all the time. You haven't shown that you need to pay taxes to a government to fight these torts. Their are free market options like private arbitration firms, private security firms, bounty hunters, selling claims to those are willing to prosecute (champerty), and other solutions that haven't been allowed to be discovered yet.

Prosecute? You mean appeal to the government to decide which of us it'll side with?

But yes, bounty hunters - also called mercenaries - would work to enforc

That would be a waste of time. Many jurisdictions are already paying for aerial imagery taken by aircraft flying and filming precise routes over their territory. They can clearly see when new structures appear or when existing structures are modified. In fact, automated algorithms can actually find the changes for them. With oblique imagery, jurisdictions can even measure the height of structures. Here is an example of a company that provides such services. Pictometry - Government - Assess [pictometry.com]

That would be a waste of time. Many jurisdictions are already paying for aerial imagery taken by aircraft flying and filming precise routes over their territory. They can clearly see when new structures appear or when existing structures are modified. In fact, automated algorithms can actually find the changes for them. With oblique imagery, jurisdictions can even measure the height of structures. Here is an example of a company that provides such services. Pictometry - Government - Assess [pictometry.com]

Very true... It is very important to most municipalities to have accurate GIS based data. It is used for so many things. I was just at the local ESRI conference in Calgary where they were showing their integrated awareness system which incorporates something like 200+ datasets from different business units. When I had a city tree removed they knew its entire history - what kind of tree, when it had been pruned. All of this helps a city run smoothly and react to requests.

Maybe the people of Lithuania don't seem to mind because their Tax Agency actually has a reputation for fairness, due process, and reasonable penalties for violators. Stranger things have happened.
I personally made use of the street view in Lithuania to "visit" my ancestors' villages. (They left for the US ca. 1910, but the villages have survived the past century pretty well.)

Maybe the people of Lithuania don't seem to mind because their Tax Agency actually has a reputation for fairness, due process, and reasonable penalties for violators.

ROFL

Here's one thing I know about the Tax Agency. They provide explanations of certain tax laws, basically "the law says you have to do this, this and that", then, some time later, they change the explanation and fine anybody who was following the previous explanation essentially for not being able to see the future.

http://boingboing.net/2010/05/04/satellite-photos-cat.html [boingboing.net]> As the nation of Greece teeters on the edge of bankruptcy, its tax authorities> are taking aim at Greece's notorious tax-evading rich elite. Using satellite> photos, the tax authority examined the claim of the residents of Athens's> wealthy suburbs and discovered that, rather than the 324 swimming> pools claimed by the locals, there were 16,974 of them.

I do not understand why governments do not adopt the balanced account system: each individual or business should have their accounts balanced: their current expenses plus current savings must match the savings of the previous year plus their current earnings.

Thus, with such a system, no one would be able to hide profits, simply because if they did so there accounts would be unbalanced.

I've been impressed enough to give job references ("I worked supervising Mr.X at Y for Z months, and when I had to give Mr.X shit for his equipment falling apart, he impressed me with his repairs, and his honesty." He went on to work for much higher pay with less unreliable equipment and so had to lie less.)
And I'm glad to see that others are as imaginative, and effective. Good one, guys and girls! Sock it to them and make sure that the rich thieves pay their taxes!

The problem is VAT is a sales tax. Sales tax hit those who spend more of their income harder than those who spend less- they're the most regressive form of taxation there is. That's the exact opposite of what taxes should do. What we ought to do instead is actually prosecute tax frauds, reduce loopholes in the tax code, and make investment income tax at a higher rate than earned income.

Erm, nope. Pretty much everywhere in Europe has both. We pay income tax when we earn money and VAT when we spend it. We also incur income tax when we save it and get paid interest by the bank.

In fact ~25% of my gross income gets taken in income tax and National Insurance via PAYE before I even get my hands on it, then most stuff I buy has a 20% VAT on top of it (there are exceptions: some stuff is a lower rate and an even small amount of stuff is zero rated).